You and the Night / Les Rencontres d’apres minuit (Yann Gonzalez, France, 2013, 91 min)
Wisconsin Film Festival, Monday, April 7 at 8:45pm & Tuesday, April 8 at 9:15pm»
First, I should clarify: I pixellated Eric Cantona’s flaccid penis in the image above, not the filmmakers. So when you go see Yann Gonzalez’s adult fairy tale, You and the Night, at the Wisconsin Film Festival, you will see it (or a prosthetic, who knows these days) in its full glory. In a way, the image above is a metonym for the flaccid parts of You and the Night: people talking explicitly about fucking while standing around with a limp dick. At its best, however, the film is refreshingly frank and imaginative, with a near-perfect dreamy tone set by the soundtrack from M83 (Anthony Gonzalez from M83 is the director’s brother).
The basic plot concerns young lovers, Ali (Kate Moran) and Matthias (Neils Schneider), and their transvestite maid, Udo (Nicolas Maury), preparing to meet their unknown guests for a late-night orgy (you know, that old saw). Their guests end up literally being archetypes and stereotypes: The Slut (Julie Brémond), The Stud (former Manchester United football player, Cantona), The Teen (Alain-Fabien Delon, son of legendary actor Alain Delon), and The Star (Fabienne Babe). From the beginning, Matthias seems uncomfortable with the proceedings, despite the fact that Ali seems convinced that the orgy is necessary. With Matthias’s eye patch (which, of course, must be explained later), Schneider comes across as a B-grade Robert Pattinson (or is Pattinson a B-grade Schneider?). So Moran does most of the heavy lifting when conveying Ali and Matthias’s young passion and devotion to each other.
“Don’t worry dear,” Ali explains to The Slut, “You will fuck, and be fucked. Like the teen tart you are.” If this were a production from the San Fernando Valley someone would hit the wah-wah pedal at this point and riff for the duration of all of the promised permutations of boy-girl, girl-girl, and boy-boy action. But it’s not from the Valley, it’s from France, so we’re in for a lot of talking instead. Each character has a flashback or fantasy sequence (or both) explaining some part of their sexual history and/or psychological profile. If this sounds like one long, protracted tease, indeed it is. Not all the backstories showcase the equivalent amount of inspiration or inspire the same level of interest, but once we get to Ali and Matthias’s backstory, we cross over into the realm of a genuine fairy tale. With the fairy tale, the film turns from trashy to absurdly charming, before returning to self-indulgence.
One great conceit, sadly under-utilized, is the apartment’s stereo system, called the “sensory jukebox.” When anyone touches the device, their personality and disposition determines the music. “It plays who you are,” explains Udo, the maid. While at times it seems like a shameless excuse to include more M83 music, it also provides some of the highlights of the film, like when The Slut dances herself into a frenzy. This device should play well to a key target audience here in Madison, the TriBeCa (Triangle Behind the Capitol) DJ scene. So expect to see those Majestic, Merchant, and Maduro hoodies in the crowd.
Despite all of the hedonistic posturing, ultimately the film is interested in relatively conventional couple formation by the end. And the alternative threesome at the center of the fairy tale is only given lip service. Despite the explicit language, the film has a strangely prudish attitude towards the representation of the body. The nudity remains relatively classical or abstract rather than messy and physical (but who am I to judge there, I felt compelled to pixilate a flaccid penis). This tends to undercut the “daring” of the film, but then again that is a label that others, like Robert Koehler at Film Comment, have put on the film, not necessarily something that the film itself demands to be called. I think a better description might be: a witty fantasy whose bark is more daring than its bite.